Shreya Jha
MUSICIAN AND COMPOSEr
Shreya Jha is a composer, performer, teacher and pediatrics resident.
BiOGRAPHY
Shreya Jha is a composer, lyricist, playwright, educator, and pediatrics resident at McMaster University. She previously completed medical school and dual Bachelors degrees in neuroscience and music composition at the University of Toronto. She is keenly interested in music composition, musical theatre, music education, and interdisciplinary research.
Shreya’s first musical Statistics (book, music, and lyrics) premiered at the U of T’s Drama Festival in February 2019. It then went on to be win the Adams Prize for Musical Theatre at the Toronto Fringe Festival. It made its Fringe debut in 2022. Statistics was shortlisted for the Playwrights’ Guild of Canada’s Robert Beardsley Award and appeared in the 2021 shortlisted play bundle.
Shreya’s second musical Connections was premiered in November 2019. LUV, written as a collaboration, debuted as a cast Album in 2020-2021. 18 Palace Road debuted in fall 2021 and was remounted in Fall 2024. The Last Piece debuted in summer 2023 and was later performed at Hart House Theatre in 2024 and the SheNYC festival in summer 2025.
Shreya made her professional compositional debut with the National Arts Centre Orchestra in April 2021. Her piece, Just Tango With Me will be performed at an upcoming concert (TBD) The Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra has performed her pieces String Sonata Op. 8 Mvt 4 - Allegro Vivace, Adversity, Spring in the Step, Forgetting and her arrangement of a traditional Inuit song, This Child. In March 2017 and 2018, the Gryphon Trio premiered her pieces Vexation and Two Left Feet at their Trinity College coffeehouse. The Bold City Contemporary Ensemble selected her piece Journey Through A Daydream for programming in their 2017-2018 season. The Can-Am Trio will premiere her piece Tributes in an upcoming season.
Shreya continuously explores the intersections between music and science, including education and research. She developed a composition program at Sistema Toronto and remains an involved artist. She has also worked with the Music and Cognition Lab at the University of Toronto Mississauga, the Behavioural Cardiology Research Unit at Toronto General Hospital, and the Toronto Dementia Research Alliance in conjunction with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.
Shreya received her Associate of the Royal Conservatory (ARCT) in piano performance with honours in June 2016. She is an active violist and violinist and has played with both the Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra and the University of Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
PReSS
By day, she’s a pediatric resident. By night, she’s writing a musical.
“McMaster University pediatric resident and composer-playwright Shreya Jha is discovering that caring for children and telling their stories are two sides of the same calling.”
“While medicine and musical theatre may seem worlds apart, Jha sees them as two ways of exploring the same question: How do children experience the world?”
Cheryl Crocker, July 2026
Bringing Alzheimer’s to the Stage
“Shreya developed the musical from the very beginning. Her process always starts with the music, with the dialogue coming later. As a naturally talented musician, that is just how she works. We talked about this, and she explained that much of her inspiration for the musical came from exploring how music can mimic and help us understand the experience of memory loss. There is a lot of research showing that music can aid with memory loss, but Shreya was curious about flipping that idea—using music to convey what memory loss feels like. For instance, themes that repeat throughout the musical or moments where the music begins to break down were used to reflect Andrew’s mental state as he experiences memory decline. It was such a fascinating aspect of the show, and it tied into the fact that most of the production was music-heavy, with very few sections free of music.”
-Dr. Pamela Fuentes Peralta and Olivia-Autumn Rennie, 2025
Toronto Fringe Must-See: Statistics
“Jha’s score is a mezzo-soprano paradise with meaty roles for three very different performers. Maddie Sekulin, Rachel Mundy, and Colette Richardson all have great moments in this production, not a single one of them fading into an archetype. There are four male roles as well, evocatively written to be almost interchangeable in their irritating dismissiveness. Michael Manning and Oliver Daniel excellently embody the self-involved smarm of Franklin’s colleagues, playing men who casually steal credit without ever themselves stealing their female costars’ deserved spotlights.
I want a full scale musical about women in STEM on international stages, I want this cast recording on my phone. Fringe could use a new “started at the Fringe” story. If it were up to me, this would be it.”
Kelly Bedard, 2022
Shreya Jha's Works
by Shreya Jha
A sample of Shreya’s instrumental compositions. Shreya’s works have been performed by ensembles such as the Scarborough Philharmonic, the Mississauga Children’s Choir, the Can-Am trio, and the Gryphon Trio.
Musical Theatre
Statistics
Winner of the 2020 Adams Prize for Musical Theatre
Toronto Fringe Festival, July 6-17 2022
‘Statistics’ tells the story of Rosalind Franklin - a talented biologist working on the structure of DNA in the 1950s - and Rose Andersson, a current-day student trying to get into medical school. The two female scientists, though separated by half a century, each face their own challenges in their races against the clock. In their darkest moments, they form a connection of grit, perseverance, and love for the beauty of scientific discovery.
“The bones of a great, big, impactful musical are here. It’s a foundation that deserves to be built upon. I want a full scale musical about women in STEM on international stages, I want this cast recording on my phone.” -Kelly Bedard, My Entertainment World
Full review: https://www.myentertainmentworld.ca/2022/07/toronto-fringe-must-see-statistics/
Connections
PREMIERED Nov 20, 2019 at the Trinity college dramatic society
RECORDING: September 4-6, 2025 - THe Theatre Centre
Connections, set at Heathrow airport, discusses the potential enduring impact of brief exchanges between people at airports and expresses themes of love, family, and humanity.
The LAST PIECE
HART HOUSE THEATRE 2024, SHENYC FESTIVAL 2025, WILD IMAGININGS WACO 2026
The Last Piece follows divorced couple Amara and Andrew as they unexpectedly end up in each other’s lives after an Alzheimer’s Disease diagnosis.
18 Palace Road
Premiered October 15-16 2021 at Grace-Church-On-The-Hill
First DRAFTS, THEATRE SHERIDAN, 2024
18 Palace Road explores the vulnerable, close relationship between a music student and teacher and examines how our mentors shape us and how grief affects our craft as artists.
Education
Sistema Toronto
As a composition teacher at Sistema Toronto, Shreya Jha facilitated an online COVID-19 concert partnership with University of Toronto musicians to premiere new pieces written by students in the 2019-2020 academic year.
